Relocation - Redundancy

5823yil

I have been told my job is relocating. My company have said I can take redundancy or go to new location.
The new location is 1 hour away and told same hours - however i have to take kids to school which means I could not get there at this time. Would I qualify for flexible working due to this also my son has a registered disability.
Also would my company have to pay a mileage allowance as they sre relocating me.

I dont know where I stand and could do it.. just dont know the law on this or how to do this.

SarEl

There is no law about paying for relocating you - that is up to the company, and where companies do, it is usually only for a specific period of time. You would have to ask the company about flexible working - you have the right to ask, and (with good reasons) they have the right to refuse. But you won't know until you ask.

5823yil

SarEl wrote: »

There is no law about paying for relocating you - that is up to the company, and where companies do, it is usually only for a specific period of time. You would have to ask the company about flexible working - you have the right to ask, and (with good reasons) they have the right to refuse. But you won't know until you ask.

The other thing I wondered if my job exists in another location is that still redundancy?

p00hsticks

5823yil wrote: »

The other thing I wondered if my job exists in another location is that still redundancy?

Depending on your employment contract, I believe it is - your location forms part of the job description, so if the job at a particular location is no longer available the people doing that job are redundant.

SarEl

Only partially correct - and it depends on the interpretation of location. Job descriptions are not contractual in 99% of cases, and location is not absolute in contractual terms. So if your written statement of main particulars says that you work at the Smith Street depot, and your job at Smith Street depot disappears due to the job being relocated to the Brown Street depot, that does not mean that there is a redundancy at all. It could be the case that nobody is redundant. Whether they are or not depends on several things:

(a) whether Brown Street is close to Smith Street. By close I broadly mean within 50 miles (which is the travel to work distance used as a rule of thumb by tribunals). If it happens to be two streets down or in the same town, then in almost all circumstances this would not be a redundancy, although in certain personal circumstances an individual might argue it is. But generally, it wouldn't be - not these days.

(b) whether there is a mobility clause in the contract. If the new job location is more than a short distance away (as defined above) then a mobility clause in the contract can be used to force relocation, and again there is no redundancy. If you refuse then this is resignation. Again, it is possible to argue some exceptions to this, but as a general rule of thumb it applies.

(c) in absence of either of the above, it also depends on what the employee might want to do. If the employee prefers to remain in work and wishes to relocate their job then there is no redundancy.

The primary definition of a redundancy is where there is a reduction in work and/or a reduction in the number of posts needed to do certain work. Because it is posts that are made rdeundant and not people. So switching the location of a post is not part of the primary definition, and as I said, may not ever constitute redundancy of the post. Location of a post is only a secondary element, not a primary, and there may be a variety of reasons why relocation of a post does not constitute redundancy in law. In this case the employer appears to be willing to allow either option - redundancy or relocation - without dispute on thier part, so it doesn't really matter too much; and given the OP's personal circumstances then the additional travelling time to the new location would be firm grounds to refuse a relocation of this distance anyway.